Why the Dialog Tag Language (DTL)?

If you are already familiar with a tag-based markup language, such as HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) or IBM® BookMaster®, you will find that DTL is very similar. IBM created DTL for many of the same reasons that we created BookMaster:

Markup tags are easy to use. Because tag names are short and relate directly to the structure of the dialog elements, they are also easy to remember.
DTL lends flexibility to application development. Panels can be quickly changed without your having to tediously line up text and fields. This gives you greater control over application development and updates.
DTL provides consistency when many programmers are working on the same application, or when programmers who are new to your company must update existing applications. Since each programmer is using the same tags, only minor adjustments may be needed to achieve complete uniformity.
DTL techniques improve the way in which interactive programs, like ISPF applications, are developed. The language concentrates on the role of the various elements and their interrelationships, and ISPF takes care of their form and appearance at run time.
DTL also enforces some formatting rules defined by the Systems Application Architecture® Common User Access (CUA), so you do not have to be familiar with all of the CUA formatting rules. Therefore, the CUA skills required by programmers who are developing CUA-conforming applications are significantly reduced.
DTL enables multicultural support and the conversion utility provides NLS translations for certain key words.

In other words, DTL is an application development and maintenance system that is sophisticated, flexible, and easy to use.

Examples of DTL usage by ISPF are provided in data set ISP.SISPGxxx, where xxx is a standard ISPF language identifier. Consult your ISPF system administrator for the actual location of these examples.